Why Zucchini is Evil
by me in the present tense
Summary: Ever wondered how that demon imposter-of-cucumber came to be? I have, on very classified knowledge, the story. Also a little bit of commentary on my mom's cooking. And Circe. And Heracles/Hercules. :


**Hi folks! This is a big departure from what you're probably used to from me, if you've ever read anything I've written. However, I enjoy it. **

**For those of you who don't know what peppersteak and broccoli-tuna roll-ups are, first of all you're lucky. The former is tiny strips of cheap meat with tomatoes and green bell peppers cooked in. I hate bell peppers. Broccoli-tuna roll-ups are a perversion known to man. They're absolutely disgusting. Picture vomited brocolli, tuna, and alfredo sauce and that's what the filling looks like. Basically it's brocolli-tuna-celery-gross-sauce in a baked tortilla with cheese and french fried onions on top. I told you, absolutely disgusting. **

**DISCLAIMER: I have never, nor will I ever, presume to own the gods, heroes, and villians mentioned here. That's be downright hubris and I'd deserve divine wrath after that. Mea culpa, mea culpa, mea GRAND culpa. I also don't own Disney. If I did, I would turn this into a film But I don't. *sigh* I'm very low-budget.**

Why Zucchini is Evil

It is widely acknowledged that some foods are evil. Downright, plain evil.

This is the case with three foods: Peppersteak, Broccoli-Tuna Roll-Ups, and zucchini.

Why are these three evil? To answer that, we must go to a time long, long ago.

Back when the world was fresh and new and man was still young on this Earth in the land of

Aegea, people believed in great heroes who saved their country from cruel monsters, the Minotaur, the Cyclopes, the Draconae, and many, many more. The heroes were wise and strong and brave, able to fight to the last drop of Aegean blood that flowed in their veins. Their names ring out to this day: Jason, who with his Argonauts sailed the sea; Oddyseus, the plague of high school English students; Perseus, lover of Andromeda yet in the stars; Theseus, of the Labyrinth; and those from battle like Achilles. These and more ruled the minds of the Aegeans, dreaming of splendor and strength beyond their own.

One of these was brave, fought hard, and is forever immortalized in a cartoon movie, where he chooses the love of a mortal woman over the vastness of immortality on Mount Olympus. The fool. Fortunately for the brave Greeks, their hero was different. He was braver, stronger, and had better enemies. In a battle of epic enemies, Hera is up there with the worst of them.

Many know that Hercules fought in twelve trials to prove his strength and his valor. In the hearts of the Aegeans he was above many would-be heroes. But there was one tale that few ever knew: Hercules's thirteenth trial.

There are many reasons that it is unfamiliar to all but the most dedicated of scholars. Those with the blessing of Athena upon may have a chance at glimpsing the story, for it was hidden deep by the Department of Homeland Epicity. It wasn't as epic of a battle as the other ones, it didn't end happily for Hercules, and the Council of Aegean Mothers for Better Table Habits threatened the Department with death and Brussels sprouts if they didn't remove it from the story.

Hercules, having just finished his last trial, came upon a lovely young woman with a plateful of food. "My lord, my strong fighter lord, if it pleases the gods and you, I have food to offer. Foods not even the gods would refuse," she said, bowing slightly to his prowess and his ego as she extended the plate towards him.

Hercules looked at her and her food. "O offerer of…food," he started. He never was a genius. He was merely the brawn. Occasionally his math tutor would yell at Hercules for not understanding his new theorem about hypotenuses and right triangles and squares.

Hercules cleared his throat. "O offerer of food," he began again, "your gift is kind and thoughtful and generous. No god could refuse, for you are…" He wracked his brain for some more compliments, but again drew a blank. "You are kind and thoughtful and generous. And beautiful," he added randomly. It never hurt to throw that one in the compliment pot.

She smiled. "O mighty Hercules who smiles upon me like Zeus's thunder, take my gift and eat of it, that you may be stronger yet and protect Lady Aegea from whatever stone-hearted, cruel foes may attack her."

Hercules pulled out his traveling fork-knife-spoon combo and offered a piece to the gods. "O mighty Zeus, see my offering of this food. It is yours, for I appreciate that you, mighty among the gods chose to place this… kind and thoughtful and generous woman in my path of victory." He threw some out into the air to let Zeus have it. Out of the sun-clear, fragrant blue sky came the sound of loud thunder and a lightning bolt, which destroyed the food in an Athenian minute. Smoke curled up like a warning before him.

Hercules frowned. Usually Zeus only did that when he was mad.

But that didn't matter. He'd figure it out later. Food was before him and the only thing he like better than food was wine. He placed his fork into the food, scrunching it together and shoving it into his mouth.

Suddenly his mouth was assaulted as if by tiny demons. The gods! Were they punishing him again? Was Hera ticked enough to prevent him from eating?

The woman smiled evilly and then tilted her head back and laughed hysterically.

Hercules puked the food out, along with his breakfast. "By the almighty gods! What is this food of Hades?"

The woman stopped laughing for a moment while wiping her eyes. "It's simply a little peppersteak and broccoli-tuna roll-ups."

Even stranger the food created a strange, evil monster by combining. French-fried onions became its evilly smiling mouth. Small pieces of green pepper formed his eyes. And the rest of him was a strange, foul-smelling paste and bits of steak. "Herculesssss, we will kill yoooooouu," it said.

Hercules drew his sword and tried to hack the beast apart, but it didn't work. The creature slid around his sword like a greased pig.

The young woman started laughing again. Unfortunately for her, she snorted when she laughed. Fortunately for her, it didn't really matter anyway. When you're winning you can laugh however you want. "You look like an epic idiot! What are you possibly doing? You can't defeat me!"

Hercules continued to slash at the miniature demon, when a new idea flashed into his head. He loved how his IQ could raise up to 100 points when there was a sword in his hand, a fight to be fought, and a battle to be won. He whistled, loud and high-pitched, for a monster who was slightly less foul than this one.

Cerberus bounded over the hills. Ah, Cerberus, the great three-headed dog of the Underworld. Hercules pointed to the pile of moving food, which Cerberus scooped up in his jaws easily. The dog then made three faces like it had indigestion. It looked at Hercules sadly and tucked its tail between its legs to drag itself back to the Underworld.

The young woman stopped laughing.

Hercules looked proud and heroic--partially because he then used his proud-and-heroic pose.

The young woman screeched. "No one bests Circe! No one bests me! I am too good to be bested! I am too good! You cheated anyway! You dirty filthy chauvinistic pig among the swine of men! You are a horrible lying cheat!"

Hercules walked away, leaving Circe behind in the dust screaming like a banshee. In fact, it has been theorized that it was these screams of Circe that first inspired the Celts to create the banshee.

Circe felt gypped. The Department of Homeland Epicity decided to leave this little trial out because they felt that Hercules may in fact have cheated and it wouldn't be a good idea to convince children to feed any unappetizing food to a dog.

Circe returned though. She wanted her revenge, but it didn't come for many years, not until her youthful beauty had been replaced with hagdom in the middle ages. She gathered with other sorceresses, the young ones, like Morgan le Fay and Nimue that she thought were hot-headed and not thorough, and the old ones, her generation: Medea, Semiamaris, and Hecate. They convened to stand against young heroes who would threaten their power. They decided upon a vegetable, something small that they could slip into European households, control the market of, and yet would be popular among mothers. They created the zucchini: a fruit that seems like a vegetable and a cucumber (the most wholesome of any of the fruit-vegetables of the time) but wasn't either. They produced it using magic so evil and dark that some of the old ones were scandalized, but the young ones insisted that this way would be faster and easier. Plus they saved 30% on creation fee.

By the first pink twinges of daylight, it was done. The zucchini became a blight upon the world, fiendishly working its way into popularity and forevermore keeping the population of epic heroes down.

**The moral of the story? My mom's cooking can be downright freaky at times and I'm extremely suspicious of where some of ehr recipes come from. **


End file.
